So considering the above, is it a good idea to arm Teachers and rely on them to act 'as instructed'? Do they spend a day a month at the range? What if it is one of the teachers that does the shooting?

Going down this path is just stupidity. Even bringing in reliable 'guards' is a slippery slope. A guard worth his/her position is not going to work for peanuts, and is not going to be sharp without continued training. There are going to be better paid jobs for anyone trained and able to do this to the required standard so either the costs are huge or the standards are low or the turnover is so high as to be untenable.

I do not believe that arming the teachers should even be considered tbh. A teacher has an emotional connection with their students and would hesitiate to fire upon another person they know/love. There are alot of factors to consider. Cost of training (who would pay for this), how much training would "qualify" a teacher to certified for such a situation? What happens if a teacher opens fire on a threat but hits a innocent student? (I saw one news clip on the tv and a principle of a school was doing a training with a fire arm and he shot the wrong target. He was then asked what happens if that was a real innocent fatality and his reply was "the life of 1 innocent vs saving hundreds is worth taking the shot.") arming the teachers is a really bad idea imo.......

As for the deputy there is no one solution for this situation it can be debate many ways, For example

1) if sheriff deputy scot perterson received better training he would have perhaps had more confidence to take on the shooter and resolve the issue himself.

2) better gun laws would have prevented a 18yr old from owning an assault rifle.

3) if the countless warnings regarding the shooter Nicholas cruz were followed up in a more stringent manor this would have been prevented before it even started.

So considering the above, is it a good idea to arm Teachers and rely on them to act 'as instructed'? Do they spend a day a month at the range? What if it is one of the teachers that does the shooting?

Going down this path is just stupidity. Even bringing in reliable 'guards' is a slippery slope. A guard worth his/her position is not going to work for peanuts, and is not going to be sharp without continued training. There are going to be better paid jobs for anyone trained and able to do this to the required standard so either the costs are huge or the standards are low or the turnover is so high as to be untenable.

I do not believe that arming the teachers should even be considered tbh. A teacher has an emotional connection with their students and would hesitiate to fire upon another person they know/love. There are alot of factors to consider. Cost of training (who would pay for this), how much training would "qualify" a teacher to certified for such a situation? What happens if a teacher opens fire on a threat but hits a innocent student? (I saw one news clip on the tv and a principle of a school was doing a training with a fire arm and he shot the wrong target. He was then asked what happens if that was a real innocent fatality and his reply was "the life of 1 innocent vs saving hundreds is worth taking the shot.") arming the teachers is a really bad idea imo.......

As for the deputy there is no one solution for this situation it can be debate many ways, For example

1) if sheriff deputy scot perterson received better training he would have perhaps had more confidence to take on the shooter and resolve the issue himself.

2) better gun laws would have prevented a 18yr old from owning an assault rifle.

3) if the countless warnings regarding the shooter Nicholas cruz were followed up in a more stringent manor this would have been prevented before it even started.

So many variables in this situation

1), If he was better trained and more confident the odds are he would have moved on to a better paid job.

2&3) are the same. How do you keep the freely available item from the wrong people and who decides who are the wrong people.

It has to be stopped at source and NO ONE should be allowed to carry that sort of weapon in a ready state. Having said that, 2 16 round hand guns could be reloaded in a second so...

So considering the above, is it a good idea to arm Teachers and rely on them to act 'as instructed'? Do they spend a day a month at the range? What if it is one of the teachers that does the shooting?

Going down this path is just stupidity. Even bringing in reliable 'guards' is a slippery slope. A guard worth his/her position is not going to work for peanuts, and is not going to be sharp without continued training. There are going to be better paid jobs for anyone trained and able to do this to the required standard so either the costs are huge or the standards are low or the turnover is so high as to be untenable.

I do not believe that arming the teachers should even be considered tbh. A teacher has an emotional connection with their students and would hesitiate to fire upon another person they know/love. There are alot of factors to consider. Cost of training (who would pay for this), how much training would "qualify" a teacher to certified for such a situation? What happens if a teacher opens fire on a threat but hits a innocent student? (I saw one news clip on the tv and a principle of a school was doing a training with a fire arm and he shot the wrong target. He was then asked what happens if that was a real innocent fatality and his reply was "the life of 1 innocent vs saving hundreds is worth taking the shot.") arming the teachers is a really bad idea imo.......

As for the deputy there is no one solution for this situation it can be debate many ways, For example

1) if sheriff deputy scot perterson received better training he would have perhaps had more confidence to take on the shooter and resolve the issue himself.

2) better gun laws would have prevented a 18yr old from owning an assault rifle.

3) if the countless warnings regarding the shooter Nicholas cruz were followed up in a more stringent manor this would have been prevented before it even started.

So many variables in this situation

1), If he was better trained and more confident the odds are he would have moved on to a better paid job.

2&3) are the same. How do you keep the freely available item from the wrong people and who decides who are the wrong people.

It has to be stopped at source and NO ONE should be allowed to carry that sort of weapon in a ready state. Having said that, 2 16 round hand guns could be reloaded in a second so...

1) Not necessarily, but that is your opinion.

2) I agree on the fact that he should have been red flagged a long time ago and wasnt. As i stated previously alot of variables led to this. (Lack of follow up by many departments.)

But thats the whole debate on the constitution and how the regulations currently stand. People wanna have their cake and eat it too. A entire ban will not happen any time soon ( possibly never) As we witnessed just last week when the bill was brought to the florida senate. They wouldnt even debate it and they voted No by a huge margin.

Imo this is how it plays out new sanctions will be placed, age limits raised for assault rifles, magazine limitation placed nation wide, more stringent back round check searching for mental health (maybe even a doctor evalution/ sign off needed) and a waiting period will be placed on long guns.

I agree that the average civilian cannot know how they will react in the face of a tragedy until it is presented to them. the problem here though is that Sherriff deputy scot Peterson isn't the average civilian

This is a man who has been in law enforcement for 32 years. A man who has had countless hours/ years of training for such a situation and he froze. This is a man whom has qualified with his personal firearm to be licensed / allowed to discharge his firearm is he deems the action is appropriate WHILE ON/OFF DUTY. A man who more then likely has un-holstered his firearm in the line of duty and more then likely has engaged previous threats in his tenure as a police officer for 3 decades. This man doesn't fall under the category of a civilian. He took an oath to serve and protect the public. A man who took a job to protect a school all while armed. He wasn't there with mace, a whistle and a flash light.so his excuse of "I secured the perimeter" is disgusting to say the least. He was on duty, he was the first responder to the scene and did nothing. His own boss said that scot Peterson did nothing but take cover outside while the people he was assigned to protect were killed. This man didn't do his job and flat out let people die because he failed to go inside.

You seem to be wording this like he made a choice.

Your brain control yous. You do not control it.

During previous World Wars, we had thousands upon thousands of trained men who had taken an oath to serve their country and had an intentionally de-humanized enemy shooting at them. And they'd still stand there, pretending to pull a trigger or aiming at nothing. Add in the fact that this guy was not 'answering a call'. He wasn't sitting in his car, with time to mentally prepare himself for what was coming next. He was suddenly the one poor guy in a live shooter environment, on that precise day, and he was not expecting it in the slightest. Do you have the slightest idea how long it takes a normal brain to catch up with that kind of thing?

He was law enforcement, not special forces. It's a bad day if we want a key skill in law enforcement to be 'really good at shooting people'.

So considering the above, is it a good idea to arm Teachers and rely on them to act 'as instructed'? Do they spend a day a month at the range? What if it is one of the teachers that does the shooting?

Going down this path is just stupidity. Even bringing in reliable 'guards' is a slippery slope. A guard worth his/her position is not going to work for peanuts, and is not going to be sharp without continued training. There are going to be better paid jobs for anyone trained and able to do this to the required standard so either the costs are huge or the standards are low or the turnover is so high as to be untenable.

I do not believe that arming the teachers should even be considered tbh. A teacher has an emotional connection with their students and would hesitiate to fire upon another person they know/love. There are alot of factors to consider. Cost of training (who would pay for this), how much training would "qualify" a teacher to certified for such a situation? What happens if a teacher opens fire on a threat but hits a innocent student? (I saw one news clip on the tv and a principle of a school was doing a training with a fire arm and he shot the wrong target. He was then asked what happens if that was a real innocent fatality and his reply was "the life of 1 innocent vs saving hundreds is worth taking the shot.") arming the teachers is a really bad idea imo.......

As for the deputy there is no one solution for this situation it can be debate many ways, For example

1) if sheriff deputy scot perterson received better training he would have perhaps had more confidence to take on the shooter and resolve the issue himself.

2) better gun laws would have prevented a 18yr old from owning an assault rifle.

3) if the countless warnings regarding the shooter Nicholas cruz were followed up in a more stringent manor this would have been prevented before it even started.

So many variables in this situation

1), If he was better trained and more confident the odds are he would have moved on to a better paid job.

2&3) are the same. How do you keep the freely available item from the wrong people and who decides who are the wrong people.

It has to be stopped at source and NO ONE should be allowed to carry that sort of weapon in a ready state. Having said that, 2 16 round hand guns could be reloaded in a second so...

1) Not necessarily, but that is your opinion.

2) I agree on the fact that he should have been red flagged a long time ago and wasnt. As i stated previously alot of variables led to this. (Lack of follow up by many departments.)

But thats the whole debate on the constitution and how the regulations currently stand. People wanna have their cake and eat it too. A entire ban will not happen any time soon ( possibly never) As we witnessed just last week when the bill was brought to the florida senate. They wouldnt even debate it and they voted No by a huge margin.

Imo this is how it plays out new sanctions will be placed, age limits raised for assault rifles, magazine limitation placed nation wide, more stringent back round check searching for mental health (maybe even a doctor evalution/ sign off needed) and a waiting period will be placed on long guns.

Another tragedy will happen again and the cycle restarts.

Time for me to butt back out now, I tried not to get involved in the first place, but I'm too gobby

It's not even 40% owning guns, it's 40% live in a household where there is a gun.

At one point I had 4 guns, but we're not talking about high velocity weapons with high capacity, removable magazines. I still have 2 which are the ones I've had since I was a teen. A .22 cal revolver, and a .22 cal rifle (semi-auto with a tube magazine). When I had more the others were black powder revolvers.

For some people it's a hobby and they will own different guns for different purposes. Hunters will have larger caliber rifle for deer, shotguns for fowl, a smaller caliber rifle or pistol for small game etc. Sport shooters will have different guns for each discipline that they compete in. There are the people who are collectors who just want to have several that are variations of something they like. And of course there are the fetishists who buy as much as they can, because they can.

The NRA has on outsized influence as most gun owners aren't members, and the lobbying they do is more on the behalf of gun makers than gun owners. Lots of people who own a single gun for home defense don't care about the NRA, and many other guns owners, myself included, disagree sharply with their ideas. But it's politics so money talks and the NRA has plenty of that.

It's not even 40% owning guns, it's 40% live in a household where there is a gun.

At one point I had 4 guns, but we're not talking about high velocity weapons with high capacity, removable magazines. I still have 2 which are the ones I've had since I was a teen. A .22 cal revolver, and a .22 cal rifle (semi-auto with a tube magazine). When I had more the others were black powder revolvers.

For some people it's a hobby and they will own different guns for different purposes. Hunters will have larger caliber rifle for deer, shotguns for fowl, a smaller caliber rifle or pistol for small game etc. Sport shooters will have different guns for each discipline that they compete in. There are the people who are collectors who just want to have several that are variations of something they like. And of course there are the fetishists who buy as much as they can, because they can.

The NRA has on outsized influence as most gun owners aren't members, and the lobbying they do is more on the behalf of gun makers than gun owners. Lots of people who own a single gun for home defense don't care about the NRA, and many other guns owners, myself included, disagree sharply with their ideas. But it's politics so money talks and the NRA has plenty of that.

all too true...

However, it is paying off nicely for the NRA, as you say, they don't have any money issues, no matter wherever, or even what country, they get it from.

The NRA has on outsized influence as most gun owners aren't members, and the lobbying they do is more on the behalf of gun makers than gun owners. Lots of people who own a single gun for home defense don't care about the NRA, and many other guns owners, myself included, disagree sharply with their ideas. But it's politics so money talks and the NRA has plenty of that.

It's not purely a money thing, it's also an issue thing.

They have a sizeable membership, and likely others outside of that membership, who will vote on a single issue. Try to mess with their guns and they will not vote for you, they will be mobilised to vote against you, and they will spend their entire day finding ways to screw you over.

On the other side you have people who are more pro gun control, but aren't angry enough for them to vote on this single issue anyway.

I see a similar situation with the Conservaties, Theresa May, and Brexit. Most people did not vote for hard Brexit. The Tories know they'll lose the hard Brexiters if they don't follow their lead, but they wouldn't lose the soft Brexiters by going hard.

I long for the day politicians act in the name of morals, what is just, and what is generally accepted as the right thing to do.

The NRA has on outsized influence as most gun owners aren't members, and the lobbying they do is more on the behalf of gun makers than gun owners. Lots of people who own a single gun for home defense don't care about the NRA, and many other guns owners, myself included, disagree sharply with their ideas. But it's politics so money talks and the NRA has plenty of that.

It's not purely a money thing, it's also an issue thing.

They have a sizeable membership, and likely others outside of that membership, who will vote on a single issue. Try to mess with their guns and they will not vote for you, they will be mobilised to vote against you, and they will spend their entire day finding ways to screw you over.

On the other side you have people who are more pro gun control, but aren't angry enough for them to vote on this single issue anyway.

I see a similar situation with the Conservaties, Theresa May, and Brexit. Most people did not vote for hard Brexit. The Tories know they'll lose the hard Brexiters if they don't follow their lead, but they wouldn't lose the soft Brexiters by going hard.

I long for the day politicians act in the name of morals, what is just, and what is generally accepted as the right thing to do.

The NRA seldom if ever publish their membership numbers, and with no national registry of gun owners there's no hard number for that either. So it's hard to get a firm handle on how many gun owners are NRA members but generally it's considered to be 10% or less.

Politicians aren't as concerned with the votes of the hard line gun owners in their constituencies as much as they are the money that they won't get from the NRA and the money that the NRA will spend on ads against them.

The NRA has on outsized influence as most gun owners aren't members, and the lobbying they do is more on the behalf of gun makers than gun owners. Lots of people who own a single gun for home defense don't care about the NRA, and many other guns owners, myself included, disagree sharply with their ideas. But it's politics so money talks and the NRA has plenty of that.

It's not purely a money thing, it's also an issue thing.

They have a sizeable membership, and likely others outside of that membership, who will vote on a single issue. Try to mess with their guns and they will not vote for you, they will be mobilised to vote against you, and they will spend their entire day finding ways to screw you over.

On the other side you have people who are more pro gun control, but aren't angry enough for them to vote on this single issue anyway.

I see a similar situation with the Conservaties, Theresa May, and Brexit. Most people did not vote for hard Brexit. The Tories know they'll lose the hard Brexiters if they don't follow their lead, but they wouldn't lose the soft Brexiters by going hard.

I long for the day politicians act in the name of morals, what is just, and what is generally accepted as the right thing to do.

The NRA seldom if ever publish their membership numbers, and with no national registry of gun owners there's no hard number for that either. So it's hard to get a firm handle on how many gun owners are NRA members but generally it's considered to be 10% or less.

Politicians aren't as concerned with the votes of the hard line gun owners in their constituencies as much as they are the money that they won't get from the NRA and the money that the NRA will spend on ads against them.

I agree, by sizeable membership I didn't mean its a high proportion of the overall population. But its a big enough chunk of single-issue voters that politicians won't want to gherkin them off, and there's not enough single-issue voters with the opposite view to really swing politicians in that direction.

Agree on the ads against them, but again I think this comes down to a very hardcore group of supporters who only care about one thing. You'd expect to be able to raise similar funds for more gun-control, but there's simply not enough people who are aggressive about caring about that and that alone.

And another.... What is it going to take for you to wake up to the reality here USA?

I've read up on the history, read the arguments from both sides as objectively as I can, analysed countless (mostly useless) stats, but I'm just still left thinking....how can you not get this? How can you as a collective think this is an acceptable price to pay?

It used to be a morbid exaggeration to say these mass shootings were happening monthly or weekly. It really does feel like it's rare to go more than a short while without one of these attacks.

Now, not sidestepping the issue but isn't there advice from psychologists that not advertising these shootings, not plastering the name and photo of the perpetrator and not giving the death toll as a bar to match is considered wise? Yet, all of this is readily available in the two articles I have read on the subject.

It used to be a morbid exaggeration to say these mass shootings were happening monthly or weekly. It really does feel like it's rare to go more than a short while without one of these attacks.

Now, not sidestepping the issue but isn't there advice from psychologists that not advertising these shootings, not plastering the name and photo of the perpetrator and not giving the death toll as a bar to matchis considered wise? Yet, all of this is readily available in the two articles I have read on the subject.

Gun control would obviously help regards massacres but even so there's a wider issue with violence that needs to be dealt with. Not convinced a gun ban would actually do much for overall murder rates while this kind of mentality exists :\